TB: I believe that road along Klingermans Run may be a gated State Game Lands maintenance road (SGL 58). Because the drainage areas of these streams are so small they are likely all but dry in July and August most years. Still, wild trout do somehow survive drought conditions, so you never know. Fish and find out.

K-bob: so you're not sayin' whether or not you caught any trouts in Klingermanns? I suppose it may be impolitic to do so, given the zeitgeist of the forum. Still, I am curious to know after all this speculation. Is it a perennial stream (flowing year round)?

I did catch little brookies in klingermans but it was awfully small... people sometimes mention "jump across" brookie streams but klingermans may be "step across" maybe 6 ft average width... always the question of whether to move upstream, where these streams get steeper, but then they have even less water upstream...

if you put the names of several of these streams in the internet along with epcamr there is a good old report on them

that is the eastern Pennsylvania Coalition for abandoned mine reclamation

thanks for the remarks I was more interested in general comments on trying to choose streams from maps

foxgap I think elevation is a big factor. we recently fished two nearby streams, the first one was more fun and had more fish. There are other differences but that first one had about 5-6% grade over .5 mi, second one had about half that much grade.

W and NW of the ridge and valley province, on the plateau, stream length is an excellent indicator of how big it is. Streams all start small and grow at a rather consistent rate.

Excepting limestone regions, "catchment" size is probably the better determiner in the ridge and valley province, such as the pocono's. That can be tricky, though. Unlike plateau regions, which are virtually 100% sloped so it's easy to tell, there's lots of flat area. Fairly large streams sometimes "appear" virtually out of nowhere. They're catchment basins are actually appropriately large, but that's not so apparant from a topo map. That large flat ridge drains into 7 different streams, all of which don't seem to start to form valleys until the ridgeline.

Also, in very rocky terrain, on steeper slopes much of the water flow may actually be underground, in the rocks and rubble, rather than on the surface. Meaning flow is actually much larger than what it apepars when you walk along it. Likewise, small streams can sometimes fish bigger than they are, if they have large pools. I call it the bathtub effect. You can have a trickle or a torrent between "bathtubs", but the size of the bathtub is often what matters.

And in limestone, things are are really weird. Water can sink, flow underground, go underneath one stream and emerge in the next one over! Full fledged rivers can emerge out of nowhere, with seemingly tiny watersheds.

I also target streams that are longer with more branches feeding them in remote areas.Another thing that can be a plus for hot weather trouting - the PA Delorme shows many springs along small streams, that would help with keeping flows up

Stone Fly: Fair enough. As I said, most of us prefer the term "watershed" over "catchment," or at least we are more familiar with watershed. In any case, I just wanted to make sure that the readers understood I was talking about "area" (sq. miles) as opposed to a boundary delineation.

dryflyguy: The more branches (tribs.) that feed a stream, the larger its catchment area will be, and the greater its flow will be. Each of the streams in question is a first order stream, meaning it has no branches, but only a single channel. Each is a first order trib. to the catawissa.

When two first order streams join, they form a second order stream. When 2 second order streams join, they form a third order stream, and so on.